A dramatic overnight manhunt for a bleeding gunman ended Wednesday morning when Boulder police captured the suspect who they say fired four times — apparently shooting himself in the head — while officers tried to talk him out of a parked motorhome.

Russell Daniels, 34, was taken into custody around 7 a.m. on a bike path in the 4000 block of Baseline Road following a nearly nine-hour search, Boulder police spokeswoman Shannon Cordingly said.

Daniels was conscious and breathing, but had a gunshot wound to his head, where he was believed to have shot himself. Officers found a .38-caliber handgun on him, according to police radio traffic.

The suspect has been transported to a hospital in Denver for treatment, but Cordingly did not know the extent of his injuries. She said he was able to walk to the ambulance under his own power.

The incident started when police responded to Hickory Avenue and Brooklawn Drive in southeastern Boulder around 10:30 p.m. Tuesday after someone called complaining about a suspicious motorhome with someone living inside.

Two officers attempted to contact the man inside, identified as Daniels, but he refused to come out, and moved to the rear of the motorhome, out of sight.

A woman who was the protected party in a restraining order filed against Daniels ran from the RV and told police that they needed to get inside the motorhome. The officers did not enter the vehicle, Daniels fired four shots, police said.

Officers grabbed the woman and retreated from the motorhome, and while they were taking cover, Daniels got out of the vehicle and ran, police said.

"The officers made the decision to remove the female and make sure she was safe," Cordingly said. "As that was happening, Daniels fled on foot."

Police found a significant amount of blood inside the motorhome and believed Daniels shot himself.

Investigators at the scene where the shooting involving Russell Daniels occurred Tuesday night. Investigators at the scene in Boulder Wednesday am. (Paul Aiken)

Roads in the area, including parts of Foothills Parkway and Baseline Road, where closed overnight as police, K-9 handlers and SWAT officers assembled to search for the suspect. Armored vehicles were moved into position, and the bomb squad's robots were used to examine the motorhome and a nearby van.

By Wednesday morning, police had asked for and received the assistance of a helicopter shared by several Denver television stations, and placed an officer inside the aircraft.

After sunrise on Wednesday, police received a call from a woman in the 4000 block of Baseline Road who reported hearing someone in her garage. The family was evacuated and Cordingly said a blood trail was found in the area, though police are not certain whether Daniels ever entered the home.

Daniels was located shortly after that on a bike path near the house.

"The SWAT team did an amazing job," Cordingly said.

She said a decision will be made on what charges Daniel will face following a full investigation, though any arrest will not take place until he can be released from the hospital.

Daniels is wanted on an out-of-state felony drug warrant, according to police. He also has several pending domestic violence cases in Boulder County on charges including stalking, burglary, retaliation against a victim or witness, tampering with a witness, intimidating a witness, and violation of bond conditions, according to court records.

He was scheduled for a hearing in those cases on Sept. 16.

In this image from a TV news helicopter that was assisting police, Boulder SWAT officers are seen taking a suspect identified as Russell Daniels into custody on a bike path near Baseline Road this morning (Courtesy 7News Denver)

'Funky situation'

The older-model, brown-and-tan RV was still parked Wednesday morning on the south side of Hickory Avenue, across the street from a home at 101 Hickory Ave. The vehicle was parked near a community garden managed by Boulder nonprofit Growing Gardens.

Plots at the garden are available for between $33 and $100, and neighbor Jody Vigil described the group of gardeners who rent space there as a "really sweet community."

She said an RV being parked in front of the community garden on Hickory was "unusual."

Vigil, who lives on Brooklawn Drive, around the corner from where the RV was parked, said she never went back to sleep after she received the first automated emergency phone call from police telling her to shelter in place.

"It was really disconcerting and certainly I was concerned about my neighbors," said Vigil, who has lived there for more than 30 years. "There was no information about the RV. I was concerned more that something had happened to the neighbors. And then, yeah, it was certainly frightening when they said they were trying to find the guy because we've got a big property here and there's lots of places somebody could hide."

Shortly after 1 a.m., Vigil said she heard police talking on a loudspeaker and noises that sounded like shots, which likely was the sound of officers firing tear gas canisters at the RV.

A man who said he lived in the house at 101 Hickory Ave., which was directly across from the motorhome, said it was a "funky situation right out in front of our house."

The man, who said he did not wish to be identified, and several other people were allowed back on their property around 10 a.m. Wednesday with permission from a Boulder police officer who was parked at Hickory Avenue and Brooklawn Drive.

"It wasn't totally clear what was going on," the man said. "It was also nighttime. The police did a really good job of getting us out of there. We were escorted to a safe location."

The tree-lined neighborhood was mostly quiet Wednesday morning as investigators worked near the RV.

That's typically the case for the neighborhood northeast of Foothills Parkway and Baseline Road, said Barbara Wolpoff, who has lived in a home on Brooklawn Avenue since 1985.

"Generally this is a very quiet street," she said. "The traffic is work traffic, people going to school."

'Kind of freaky'

Though Barbara Wolpoff said she slept through the night, Stan Wolpoff woke up around 2 a.m. and never went back to sleep.

"I got up and went to the end of the house to look, didn't see anything," Stan Wolpoff said. "I walked out in the middle of the street and saw that there was some vehicle with a light shining in this direction. I saw shadows moving down at the end of Hickory."

He also saw a law-enforcement robot make its way west on Hickory. Stan Wolpoff said he didn't learn what the commotion was all about until Wednesday morning, when his son called him.

"There was no sense of urgency as far as I could determine and it looked like police were active," he said.

Neighbor Nancy Hoopes, who lives on the south end of Brooklawn Drive near Baseline Road, said she wasn't too concerned about the incident, despite hearing and seeing lots of police activity into the night.

She did say it was "kind of freaky" to know that police were searching for an armed man near her home.

"You never expect it, but we've got lots of apartments over here and there's a lot of traffic here," she said. "We're at a major intersection so we have security. You don't expect it, but I feel safe."

Thomas Wells lives near the intersection of Mohawk Drive and Aurora Avenue, a few blocks from where the arrest was made.

"When I got up this morning to see my girlfriend off on her way to work, I could see flashing police lights and a helicopter circling overhead," Wells said. "It was a little bit alarming."

Wells said he and his girlfriend typically ride their bicycles to work, but a police officer told them to avoid the bike path.

"I guess that was really good advice since they found the suspect on the bike path," Wells said.

Boulder police were still searching this morning for an armed man they say fired four shots while officers were speaking to him Tuesday night, and may have shot himself. (Paul Aiken / Staff Photographer)

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